Kalinin serves as Tessa's Operations Director with the rank of Lieutenant Commander, making him Sousuke's commanding officer and foster father—though the latter status might only exist on school paperwork. Still, there's no denying he's a genuinely fatherly presence in Sousuke's life, which makes their past as enemies all the more complicated.
Before joining Mithril, Kalinin was a Soviet Spetsnaz officer. He led the team that discovered a crashed Japanese airliner with only one survivor: a three-year-old Sousuke. That's where their bond began.
Kalinin's personal life has been difficult. His wife is deceased, and the rest of his family's status remains unknown. He's mentioned struggling to maintain family ties during his Spetsnaz days—the work consumed him. Despite everything, he was devoted to his wife, even continuing to make her borscht recipe when he came home from missions (a dish Sousuke famously refuses to eat).
His loyalty to Mithril has come under serious question, though. Fans have speculated about a potential betrayal, partly due to a suspicious meeting with Leonard Testarossa in the book Dancing Very Merry Christmas, and later his cryptic behavior during Amalgam's Merida Island raid. When he resurfaces at Leonard's villa in Tsudoku to Make My Day, his exact allegiances become murky—he could be working as Leonard's subordinate, part of an anti-Leonard faction within Amalgam, or even a Mithril deep cover agent.
Codename: Perth 1
Content compiled by AnimeList.moe from publicly available sources.
